"Should not abuse youth from Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh": Shehzad Poonawalla on Rahul Gandhi's claim on "paper leak"

"Just because Rahul Gandhi failed for the third time doesn't mean that he can abuse the youth of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh...He said that Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh are epicentres (of paper leaks). If you have some issue with an exam, you can point out its shortcomings but just because you have some personal issues with PM Modi, you make such big allegation against the youth of Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat," Poonawalla said in a press conference in Delhi on Thursday.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla hit back at Congress MP Rahul Gandhi for allegedly calling states like Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat "epicentres" of 'paper leak' saying that the latter should not make allegations against the youth of these two states only because he has "personal issues" with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "Just because Rahul Gandhi failed for the third time doesn't mean that he can abuse the youth of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh...He said that Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh are epicentres (of paper leaks). If you have some issue with an exam, you can point out its shortcomings but just because you have some personal issues with PM Modi, you make such big allegation against the youth of Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat," Poonawalla said in a press conference in Delhi on Thursday.

Poonawalla pointed out that youths from these two states will now be ridiculed as they come from states, that have been labelled by Rahul Gandhi, as "paper leak states". "This means that no exams conducted in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat are held in a fair manner. When youths from Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat go to other states, people will ridicule them saying that they must have passed the exam through dishonest means through cheating as they hail from paper leak states," the BJP leader said.

Reminding the Congress of the paper leak scam in Rajasthan during the tenure of the Congress, Poonawala said that the party was protecting the mastermind of the paper leak scam in the state when it was in power. "If there is an epicentre for paper leak in the country, it was Congress' and Ashok Gehlot's government in Rajasthan. During the Bharat Jodo Yatra, the mastermind behind the leaking of 20 papers in Rajasthan participated along with Rahul Gandhi. Who was the lawyer of the mastermind of the paper leak scam, Suresh Dhaka?...Who was protecting the mastermind of paper leak scam in Rajasthan?" Poonawala said.

Earlier while responding to a question by a reporter in a press conference on the central government giving a clean chit to the National Testing Agency in the NEET issue, Rahul Gandhi said that it is common knowledge that states like Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh have become centres of "paper leak". "They (BJP) have no credibility in these matters. If they give clean chit, it means nothing, their credibility is zero. Everybody knows that the epicentres are Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh. During my Yatras the most number of issues raised by people related to paper leaks were from Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh," Rahul Gandhi said.

Shehzad Poonawalla also raised questions on Congress candidate from Wayanad, Priyanka Gandhi for giving voice to NEET aspirant Ayushi Patel's claims whose allegations were found to be false by the Allahabad High Court. "Priyanka Gandhi, in a tweet, shared NEET aspirant Ayushi Patel's claims who said that her OMR sheet was torn...The entire video was made and the Congress party made it viral...Yesterday the High Court said that all her allegations were false and the documents submitted were fake and hence legal action will be taken against her," Poonawala said.

The BJP leader even claimed that the Gandhi siblings are spreading misinformation about NEET only to distract the public from their ally, Rashtriya Janata Dal's involvement in the NEET issue in Bihar. "Yesterday it has come to light that RJD has a big involvement in the NEET issue...This has been done to distract the audience from this and point fingers at the central government. Tejashwi Yadav's secretary Pritam is the relative of the mastermind of the NEET issue, Sikandar Yadavendu...To distract people from RJD's corruption this brother-sister duo has started spreading lies," he said.

Earlier in the day, Rahul Gandhi attacked the Modi-led central government over the NEET issue and UGC-NET exam cancellation and alleged that the reason behind "paper leaks" is that all the Vice Chancellors, the education system has been captured by the Bharatiya Janata Party's "parent organisation" (RSS). "I have spoken about institutional capture in various organizations. This is happening in the education institutions. The reason behind paper leaks is that all the Vice Chancellors, the education system has been captured by the BJP and it's parent organisation (RSS)," Rahul Gandhi said.

The NEET-UG 2024 exam was conducted on May 5 and the results were declared on June 4, ahead of its scheduled announcement date of June 14. Protests were held alleging irregularities and paper leaks as the results showed that as many as 67 students had topped the exam with a perfect score of 720. The NEET-UG examination, conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA), paves the way for admission to MBBS, BDS, AYUSH and other related courses in government and private institutions across the country.

The Ministry of Education on Wednesday cancelled the University Grants Commission-National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) exam conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA) on June 18. A fresh examination shall be conducted, for which information shall be shared separately.On June 19, 2024, the University Grants Commission (UGC) received certain inputs from the National Cyber Crime Threat Analytics Unit of the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Ministry of Home Affairs on the Examination. These inputs prima facie indicate that the integrity of the aforesaid examination may have been compromised. (ANI)

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